


light up

by 64907



Category: Arashi (Band)
Genre: Angst, Conflict Resolution, Conflict of Interests, Eventual Happy Ending, Future Fic, M/M, Misunderstandings, Nicknames
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-20
Updated: 2014-07-20
Packaged: 2018-02-09 15:18:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,605
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1987791
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/64907/pseuds/64907
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Slower, slower; we don't have time for that.</p>
            </blockquote>





	light up

**Author's Note:**

> The timeline is a little bit all over the place, but it shouldn’t cause too much confusion. Title and summary from Snow Patrol’s Run.

“That’s probably it,” Nino tells him once, back when they have a greenroom to themselves and Sho has a newspaper shoved in his face with the sounds of a video game serving as their background music. Sho is running on a three-hour sleep, so he takes a moment to move the paper aside to look at his gaming bandmate.

“Our J just grew up. It happens, Sho-chan. It just happened to him far later than it should have,” Nino finishes without looking at him, fingers fastidiously pressing keys and expression showing nothing but focus and determination towards the game.

Sho shrugs, turning back to his paper. He schools his features to betray nothing. Not here, not now. Not in front of Nino who probably knows more than he should. Nino might be right, just like how he usually is on most things, but Sho won’t let him know.

Still, Sho thinks, he didn’t have to grow up and get over me.

\--

That thought keeps him awake at night. Or maybe all the time. Sometimes, filming Zero and their regular shows coupled with magazine interviews and concert rehearsals make it hard to distinguish the days. He’s thankful, though. Thankful for the support, the fans, the work, the chance to become someone. Some people go their entire lives without ever getting what they wanted or deserved. These are hard times, and even the economy is striving on its own. He’s grateful for all of it.

Mostly, he’s thankful because all the pressure and stress from work make him forget. For a while.

\--

Contrary to what Nino probably thinks, Sho doesn’t wonder when it happened. Or how it did. These are the things he knows. He doesn’t need anyone to tell him about that.

Once, in his younger years, he would walk around the corridors of various domes all over Japan and would think he heard the familiar squeaking of sneakers across the floors accompanied with, “Sho-kun, wait for me!” In this time, he would have either turned around with a bit of impatience over his features or he would have run faster to tease the younger Jun.

Either way, it would have been familiar. But that was a long time ago and he knows when things changed between him and Jun, when Macchan became Matsujun and became Matsumoto-kun or nowadays, Matsumoto-san. He knows when Sho-kun became Sho-san and sometimes became Sakurai-kun or Sakurai-san.

He also knows how it happened. “Gradually,” he told Aiba once, when Aiba took him out for drinks and the alcohol started to work and the shyness ebbed and when Aiba started asking the questions he wouldn’t normally ask Sho. Or Jun, but Sho isn’t sure about that.

What Sho wonders about is why it happened. He thinks Jun either knows the answer or wonders about the same thing.

He isn’t sure which would be the worse to know.

\--

“Matsujun changed recently, didn’t he,” he says in an interview for one of their concert DVDs. “He can now show a gentle Matsujun without being embarrassed about it.”

Later, when the five of them met up in the greenroom and exchanged, “Thanks for your hard work,” to each other, Ohno says he wants some ramen.

“You guys go, I’ll make it up to you next time,” Sho tells them. He has work, even more work, and it’s his fault for letting them pile up for so long. He curses the incoming headache, already predicting where he’ll most likely feel the slight throbbing.

Ohno makes a pouting face, Nino just shrugs, and Aiba lets out a whiny, “Eeeehhh, Sho-chan!” It’s so familiar and it makes Sho smile for a moment.

Jun doesn’t say anything. At first. When Sho looks at him, Jun gets up from the couch and just says, “Next time,” already dragging the whining Aiba out.

Trust him to be the one to hold Sho to his word. Nino seems to get this, too, if that grin he’s trying to hide is actually meant for what Sho thinks it is meant for.

Gentle, he remembers himself saying earlier. He thinks he’s either right about it or terribly wrong.

\--

Sho confirms it in a few days.

"I haven't really been called Macchan, until now," Jun tells them in one VS Arashi filming.

"Ah, is that so?" Sho asks, and Aiba goes, "As expected, you only get called like that in bowling?"

Jun nods, "Only in bowling," while looking at him and Sho thinks, how cruel.

\--

In the end, perhaps it was just a nickname. Sho knows he can't blame Jun if he decided to forget about it, not when Sho forgot it himself. It’s been so long since he called Jun as such. To bring it back in the most nonchalant way he can manage, he must have hit a nerve.

Only that he doesn’t really know whose nerve it is. His or Jun’s. Or perhaps it belongs to the both of them. He’s not sure and he doesn’t think he will ever be.

"It'll take a while, Sho-kun," Ohno tells him one night after he made up to the promised ramen of long ago and Ohno’s arm around his shoulders.

"But you'll get there, and it'll be worth it, most likely."

He looks at Ohno, the inebriated smaller man with tanned skin who currently depends on him for balance and he finds himself having so many questions. He has so many things he wants to know and so many things he wants someone else to tell him.

He wants to ask, who’s you, but he knows Ohno will probably pick up on the true meaning behind it so he says nothing. Sho’s so uncertain these days. He can't say to Ohno's face that that's hard to believe in, but maybe Ohno's right. To not believe in what he said for even the slightest bit is the worse evil of the two, Sho thinks.

He owes that to himself, before anyone else.

He wonders what Jun thinks. If Jun, no, if Macchan spares it a thought from time to time.

He heaves a slightly dozing Ohno Satoshi into his car and drives off.

\--

Sho decides to test the waters.

He does it subtly, or whatever is the subtlest he can manage. When Yokoyama from Kanjani 8 appears as a guest in their New Year SP and tells everyone that he believes Sho looks up to Jun, Sho flushes a bit, because was he really that obvious? He doesn’t even see Yokoyama that much. But he gets over it as soon as he can and confirms it, not wanting the moment to end without him saying the most honest thing he ever did for the longest time on national television.

Jun’s embarrassed laugh is worth it, so he starts to exert some effort, bit by bit.

He proceeds to call Jun Matsumo in one regular VS Arashi filming and feels genuinely surprised when Jun just goes with it. It’s the first time Jun acknowledged it, and he knows he’s smiling big for the camera and for all of Japan to see when he says, “That’s the first time I ever called you that,” and he’s sure that the way Nino and Aiba giggle mean that they caught on to the lie, but they let it slide.

He tries to avoid referring to Jun as Matsumoto-san altogether, unless he has to address him out of formality or even out of fake formality. He simply resorts to Matsumoto-kun or Matsujun when he talks casually, to Jun, to the guest, or to the interviewers. Sho thinks it’s a big progress on his part.

“You’ll get there in the end,” Ohno told him once. “It’ll just take a while.”

\--

On their fifteenth year anniversary, Sho decides to up the game.

When Jun confesses that he refuses to wear a shirt akin to Sho’s for fear of sporting a matching look, Sho knows that Jun noticed. He wonders how long it took Jun to do so, but that’s part of the game and he sure as hell won’t lose to Jun now.

So he makes a confession of his own, that he was aiming for the two of them to wear matching shirts every time he wears the damn thing. The look in Jun’s face is more than enough, he tells himself. He wonders what’s going on in Jun’s brain at the moment. Was it expected? Did Jun somehow know that Sho did this with an ulterior motive? Or perhaps it was as simple as Jun knowing about it but refusing to believe it because like most things concerning the both of them, Sho isn’t exactly doing the most direct approach?

They’re both walking on broken glass here, and Sho wonders if Jun knows this as well.

When Nino makes a comment that they don’t mind it in the slightest and masks it with expertise, Sho finds himself feeling far more relieved than he thought possible.

In the end, Sho probably revealed more than he intended when he, in his most whiny voice applicable solely to Matsumoto Jun, ends up saying, “Won’t you wear it together with me?”

It’s an invitation, Sho thinks. He hopes Jun will take him up on it.

\--

Jun doesn’t take it for what it is. He takes it for something else Sho can’t put a name to, at least not yet.

Sho realizes this when Jun makes casual references to Sho’s CMs and refuses to look at him as when he acknowledges it. He’s pleased that Jun still has time to watch television and with the idea that Jun probably still says to his face, “Thanks for your hard work,” while he’s chewing unfrozen processed food on the screen. He thinks it’s cute, just like the little e-mails Jun sends him when he feels like it. Sho knows he’s mentioned it in more than enough interviews.

At the same time, he knows Jun’s finally caught up to his game and that they’re playing tag again, after all these years. Sho thinks they ought to have learned, being much older now.

But some things never really go away.

And just like how those things turned out to be in the past, Sho knows: he’s it.

\--

When Jun tells the entire studio that the J nickname pleases him because only Nino calls him that, Sho finally understands: Jun took it as a declaration of war.

\--

Sometimes, in between filming or when Sho’s brain allows a bit of room for thoughts, he remembers that once, when they were young, he used to have Jun the comedy leader follow him around and admit innocent things for the entire world to hear.

Back then, they didn’t have so much on their shoulders and their journey was just beginning. Back then, Nino probably still wanted to quit, Ohno was probably still thinking he can quit, and Aiba was probably just getting used to the, “We want to create a storm throughout the world,” speech.

He and Jun, well. Theirs has always been a different story.

Looking back, Jun was probably just done staking his claim over him and Sho remembers how that moment is immortalized on film and knows that it’ll take a long time for him to bear to watch it. Someday, though, he is certain that someone will show it to them and remind them of how things were when they still weren’t the superidols that they are now. He thinks that in one of the anniversaries to come, someone will do it and he and Jun will probably be thirty-four or thirty-five or perhaps a bit older, but they will still wonder about the same thing: is it love or like?

Sho wonders, if he should ask, again, after all these years, who will answer him?

It’s either J or Macchan who will, really. Either way, Sho feels like whoever it is, he’s treading the broken shards once more and one of it finally manages to cut his foot.

\--

Sho knows a resolution ought to happen one of these days.

Sho likes to plan, and so he plans ahead.

He imagines every single possible scenario for it to occur, with either Macchan or J in his mind. It depends on how much mercy he allows himself. In every imagination though, he has said whatever he deemed fit for either Macchan or J to hear. He has said what he has to say to either of them and he finds himself content.

In his imaginations, the ones with Macchan end up with him asking, “Is it love or like?”, their overdue question for fourteen years. In this one, Macchan smiles at him and says, “I think Sho-kun knows,” and that’s it, they’re both satisfied with just that. For now. Every time Sho lets himself imagine this, it always ends up with them being satisfied with where they are standing and when he looks down, there is nothing at his feet. When he looks up, he sees someone he lost so many years ago. Finds him, more like. It leaves him smiling and lets him drift to a dreamless, fitful sleep.

The ones with J are somewhat similar, but when he asks the same question, J looks at him from across the room and makes a noncommittal shrug. “You know better than I do, don’t you, Sho-san?” and this is J, the J Nino so affectionately nicknamed and he thinks, as he stops this particular imagination, this one is not mine to imagine. Nights spent entertaining that possibility leave him running on three hours of sleep, or even less.

But in the end, when it finally happens, Sho finds himself unprepared.

Only that when he’s face to face with Jun—not Macchan, not even J, just Jun—is that he realizes that he wasn’t it all along. Jun is, and Jun’s finally cornered him. It’s when Sho finally understands that he’s playing the wrong game of tag and it takes a determined Matsumoto Jun to shove it in his face.

He believes he should have known. Jun’s determination never really changed, it’s one of the things that remained constant throughout the years and Sho knows if he looks deep enough, behind the superidol image, behind the J, he will probably see same determined Macchan of long ago staring back at him.

But this isn’t Macchan, this isn’t fourteen years ago, this isn’t Arashi’s J or Matsumoto Jun the idol either. It’s just Jun, and Sho’s never been this terrified before.

\--

“What,” Sho tries, but Jun cuts him off with a hand positioned mid-air. Tells him he doesn’t get to talk, and Sho thinks, why is that, that’s unfair; he’s got a lot of things to say. In his head he tells Jun the most honest things he can never say in front of him, asks the most important of questions, and that form of imagination is what gives him the rest he needs at night. But this Jun doesn’t want to hear any of it, and Sho knows that Sakurai Sho-kun, the one Jun wouldn’t give to anyone else some years ago would definitely say something and interrupt Jun and it would be like how it was before.

But times have changed, they’re older, and Sho doesn’t really know this side of Jun he’s looking at, so he shuts up. He feels himself stepping on broken glass and perhaps, if he listens enough, he will hear a distinct crunch.

“I don’t know what you’re playing at,” Jun tells him, and Sho’s brain flares up. Liar, it says, you know exactly what. You’re playing this with me, I can’t play tag all by myself, and isn’t this how we’ve always been? Why must you lie about these things? But he never says anything because Jun’s hand is still mid-air and it’s enough, more than enough for Sho to see it. It’s like Jun’s touching the barrier they’ve erected between themselves through the years and Jun is leaning against it for support. Perhaps Jun needs it. Sho thinks he needs it as well, but perhaps for a later time.

“But whatever it is, it’s been so long,” Jun continues. “So long, Sho-san, and I’m tired.”

Sho can’t help it. He knows he’s not supposed to talk, not yet at least, but he finds himself going, “Tired of what?” I’m tired too, he wants to say. Tired of thinking, tired of work, tired of hearing Sho-san when you can call me Sho-kun. It’s different. I’m tired of doing this with you without knowing if you get me or not.

He catches Jun’s eyes narrowing and there’s a hint of frustration there, mixed with a bit of anger. But Sho can’t take his words back, and he won’t, he knows it’s too late for that and he’s too old for some excuse made up on the spot. He’s been running for so long. He’s tired too, can’t Jun see that?

Jun looks at him square in the eye and puts his hand down. Sho waits for a beat, and another, and nothing. When Sho finally decides to say something, anything Sho, tell him how it’s been for you, how you ran back then but not now, how he never really left you alone despite your eighteen year old self once telling him to do so, how you miss and terribly miss—

“I’m tired of chasing after you,” he hears Jun say, and watches as Jun moves away with resignation in his features and disappointment in his eyes. It’s not the first time he’s seen that, he knows he’s seen those same brown orbs staring back at him after he said, “Leave me the fuck alone, Matsumoto,” one time in their youth. Or in his youth, perhaps Jun wasn’t as young as he imagined him to be during that time. Sho now knows how his imaginations turn out to be terribly wrong.

Has he really screwed it up so much? Sho doesn’t know.

Later, when he’s looking at Jun’s back moving away, away from him, he finds his own hand hanging mid-air with wait dying on his lips. Wait for what? What does he want to say? What is left for him to say? Jun spelled it out for him and Sho knows he should say something, something important, or something he’s always wanted Jun to know but never got the chance to tell him, or perhaps all of those at once. But he hasn’t prepared for this. In his mind, he finds Jun, and Jun’s waiting for him, and between them there is nothing but unspoken truths they both ought to know by now.

Instead, for the second time today, he sees that barrier and feels it far sturdier than it used to be.

\--

“Matsujun hasn’t changed at all,” he tells an interviewer. He thinks it’s the most honest thing he ever said after Jun finally ended their game of tag. “Neither of us did,” he concludes, and watches as the interviewer nods satisfactorily, thinking he meant Arashi in its entirety.

He doesn’t comment any further, and when the topic moves towards their plans for the future, he blinks and thanks whatever deity is out there for small mercies. His fingers idly stroke the leather of the couch he’s sitting on and he remembers, distantly, as he answers that he wants Arashi to continue the way they’re going now, that once, in a similar couch, Jun held him to his promise of next time.

But this isn’t a promise of ramen, and Sho’s working, so he does what he’s been trained to do for years. He smiles for the camera.

\--

“Gradually,” he once told Aiba over whiskey when Aiba started asking the questions they so carefully dodged for the longest time the five of them knew.

That night, when Aiba made him elaborate on it further, he thinks he mentioned the essentials despite the alcohol getting into his system. They were both inebriated enough for it to be a blur, but Sho thinks he remembers enough: I told him to leave me alone, and what did Matsujun say Sho-chan, nothing, only that he did it, and how did he do it, gradually. What are you now Sho-chan, we are Arashi, no, not we, just you and Matsujun, isn’t it obvious? We’re bandmates that’s what we are, is that so, is that all you are now? What are we Aiba-chan? We are friends, Sho-chan, yes, we are.

That was way back when they just had their first concert in the National Stadium. Looking back, they’ve come a long way indeed. Did he ever imagine that a plane representing their country would have their faces plastered all over it? Did he ever imagine hosting a national music program shown only during New Year’s Eve? So much has changed in so little time and they’ve come so far. Arashi has come so far.

Six years later, right now, as he twirls another glass of whiskey and waits for it to finally take effect, Sho thinks that the same couldn’t possibly be said for him and Jun. But Jun has come so far, his mind counters, and yes, he has, he finds himself agreeing.

He has come so far without me, he realizes, and it stings.

\--

Sometimes, he wishes he can bring forth twenty-two year old Sho when he needs to be like him once more. Back when he was torn between listening to what people say and not giving a damn at all, when he still hasn’t got a sense of his own identity. During that time, he was so focused on searching for something to call his own without ever realizing he was losing something else as a form of cruel exchange.

Twenty-two year old Sakurai Sho wouldn’t feel the sting of losing someone. He would deem it to be inevitable and something that has been, “a long time coming.” He envies that Sho, for that Sho was pretty much numb and too focused on the less important things to mind the truly important ones. Selfishly, he thinks that that Sho would probably take this better than how his thirty-two year old self is faring, and that that Sho would probably laugh at his face.

Still, he finds himself far more open to the idea of his younger self mocking him than meeting someone else’s eyes and seeing nothing but resignation and disappointment staring back at him.

\--

Sho knows the others feel it, too. They’ve been together for the longest time and all it takes is one pause, one beat, and that’s all they would ever need. Nino probably knows more than he should, same goes for Ohno, and Aiba probably refuses to acknowledge it when he’s with either Sho or Jun. But it’s there, and there’s no point denying it, so Sho just waits for whoever wants to address it to just say it to whoever they want to say it to. It’s either him or Jun, anyway.

He expected Nino, but it’s Ohno who does.

He finds himself laughing as Ohno begins to complain about his difficult lines full of technical terms for a drama, and when Ohno stops for a moment to tell him that that’s the first time he truly laughed in a long time, he pauses and braces himself for what’s coming.

“You’re tired too, aren’t you,” Ohno tells him, and Sho knows it isn’t a question. He knows Ohno doesn’t mean the work, the rehearsals he has to catch up on, or the filming taking place here and there. It’s simply a casual observation, from bandmate to bandmate, and he just sighs. It’s the best comment he can give over the thing. He thinks he has done well enough. Eighteen year old Sho would answer haughtily, “No shit,” if the same thing was said to him, for entirely different reasons. He’s come a long way too, he supposes.

Ohno says nothing for the next few minutes and they sit in silence. Sho wonders how they look like to strangers: two thirty-something men sitting together seemingly plagued with different thoughts and problems sharing a late dinner and a round of drinks, perhaps. Do people see Ohno for who really is or simply as Arashi’s leader? When Sho looks at the man sitting beside him, he knows he can answer for himself. He sees someone who knows Sho far more than he ever thought someone like Ohno Satoshi is capable of. It’s now or never, Sho decides. He takes a shot and exhales.

In the end, when he tells Ohno whatever Sho deemed him worthy to know, he sees no judgment from the older man’s eyes. There might be a bit of sadness there, he thinks, but it could be just the lighting. Sho waits for a beat, and two, turning to a minute and another.

When Ohno speaks, Sho can say he’s seen it coming. “When I told you,” the older man begins, and Sho cuts to the chase, “Yes, I remember,” and Ohno smiles. There’s patience there, like Sho’s suddenly five years old and can’t wait for his turn in a public ride, and Sho feels embarrassment for his sudden impatience. Eighteen year old Sakurai Sho would have laughed. He looks at Ohno apologetically, and the older man just nods.

“Give it time, Sho-kun,” is all he says in the end, and Sho wants to ask, how much longer, then?

But he knows there’s a limit to the answers this man possesses, so he doesn’t.

\--

In one Shiyagare filming, he and Jun have been asked by the female guest to compliment each other.

He doesn’t know if Jun notices it when Nino actually straightens out. Knowing Nino, he’s probably laughing over some inside joke in his head, finding everything to be amusing, but Sho's exhausted enough as it is, so he tries his best to ignore Nino’s knowing glances and focuses on the task at hand.

When Jun tells him colored hair suits him best, he doesn’t bother to stop himself from laughing. Honest or not, whether it was done in the spur of the moment or not, he will take it. He’ll take it over a hand positioned between them telling him to stop this, stop right now, I won’t hear you out, you listen, you listen to me, I’m telling you I’ve had enough, I’m tired, Sho-san, tired of you, of coming after you after so many years.

He’ll take it over any claims that some years ago, it’s only during bowling that Jun remembers.

\--

He allows work to get to him. He has a lot of hosting jobs now, on top of his newscasting duties. He lets it take over, he allows himself to get focused into being busy to somehow numb whatever he’s feeling. Not that he can name it; he thinks no one can really put a name to anything associated with Matsumoto Jun. That’s how he refers to Jun, nowadays. He feels the barrier, feels it more than sees it, and he acknowledges it’s there. If that’s what Jun wants, no, if this is exactly what Matsumoto-san wants, then he will acquiesce. He owes Jun that much, he thinks.

For a while, it actually works. When he smiles for interviews, he doesn’t get the, “Let’s try that again one more time,” any more than he’s used to, and he thinks it’s progress. When he laughs on camera, it doesn’t look that forced anymore, if the amount of cuts being lessened should mean anything. When he does Zero, he finds lesser e-mails from his mother telling him about his mistakes. He works hard enough for him to want nothing but sleep the moment he returns home.

Then somebody suggests Pikanchi 2.5 and Sho feels all his progress being put to the test.

\--

2.5 is exactly what it is, halfway from the finished second Pikanchi movie and halfway to the third one that probably won’t happen in a long time.

Sho remembers how his character, Chu, has changed from the first one to the second. It’s Chu who finds himself settling down before the others and the one who ends up breaking the promise between friends. Back then, he didn’t really understand how someone thought he’d bring justice to the character. But now, ten years later, he thinks whoever thought Chu is fitting for him knew how things were even before he himself did. He doesn’t know whether he ought to be grateful or not.

When he gets the script, he takes a moment to stare at the cover and traces the .5 with his hand. The same hand that instinctively reached out on its own and seemingly said, wait. Don’t go; don’t walk out of that door. Not yet. Hear me out even if I don’t know what to say. I still don’t, but don’t walk out just yet.

He thinks back to what Ohno said to him, some weeks ago. Give it time, Sho-kun, and he considers, briefly, if what he’s doing is actually giving it some time. Perhaps. He has never been known for patience, twenty-something year old Sakurai Sho would hit someone with an umbrella for trying the limits of the non-existent virtue. But he isn’t twenty-something anymore and he ought to know better, so he tries. He really does. When he starts to believe he has tried hard enough, he pushes himself even further.

He traces the .5 once more and thinks that it sure took them a while to reach halfway.

Give it time, Sho-kun.

\--

“You’ve been dancing around each other’s heels for a while now,” Nino says to him as he makes himself at home at Sho’s trailer. They’re finally shooting for 2.5 and Sho’s trying to take a nap before his scheduled take. It’s the five of them in a scene and he knows he needs a nap to have a better sense of whatever’s coming.

“Good morning to you, too,” is all he tells Nino in the end. He’s tired of this. He doesn’t think he can reiterate that more than enough for it to finally sink in, but this is Nino, and Nino is nothing if not persistent.

He’s also a little shit sometimes, his mind supplies.

“Skip the niceties, Sho-chan, and don’t dodge what I just said.” Nino crosses his arms at him.

Sho honestly cannot think of what to say to Nino, so he crosses his arms in return and just stares at his bandmate. All he wanted was a quick nap, because if he doesn’t get it he’ll probably lose his cool over the smallest things, and here’s Ninomiya with his poking and prodding and Sho feels he has no time for that or the patience for it. He’s suddenly twenty-something again. He feels the temper rearing its ugly head.

“Don’t get all grouchy on me, Sho-chan, I’m not the one who didn’t get to talk,” Nino says with the tiniest bit of smile hinted at the corners of his tiny mouth and Sho doesn’t even have to ask how he knew. Of course he knew, and who else would tell him? J did, naturally. In his head, there are three personas of Jun: Macchan, the one he can once call his own; J, the one Nino affectionately nicknamed and the one that caught on, and Matsumoto Jun of Arashi. What Sho doesn’t know is which one told him how tired he was, but Sho supposes Nino has no idea either.

“Did you lose?” is what he hears when Nino breaks the silence. He means the game and Sho knows it, but Sho doesn’t know the answer to that. Are they still playing? Is he still playing tag with Jun? Who is he playing with, anyway? And if they are still doing it, who’s it, this time? Is it the same game, still, or have the rules changed without him knowing?

Sho is done with assumptions and imaginations and whatever his brain can cook up so he just sighs in resignation. He doesn’t know. It’s the rawest form of admission he can manage over something he truly has no idea about, over something he totally has no control over. Not that he ever had it in the first place.

He never really knew where he stands when Jun is involved.

Nino just nods, and when Sho closes his eyes, he hears the air conditioning’s steady humming and he lets it linger.

He doesn’t notice that he has fallen asleep and when he wakes up, he finds a blanket draped over his sleeping form.

\--

Sho thinks, after filming 2.5 and after rehearsals for the Hawaii concert, to hell with assumptions. To hell with all of his imaginations. He’ll take this, whatever this is, for what it really is and he’ll stop running. He always said he’s tired, but apparently, it took him this long to acknowledge that he’s finally tired enough to let it all go and let things unfold on their own.

He thinks this is different from Ohno’s advice of giving it time but notes it as progress. Twenty-something year old Sho, the one who didn’t know what patience was, has come a long way from losing tempers and lashing out with umbrellas and Sho thinks it’s the same for everybody else.

\--

On the night after the successful Hawaii concert, they go out for celebratory drinks.

The reception has been overwhelming, he honestly didn’t think that the site of their debut would change so much and feel almost nostalgic at the same time. He knows he’ll never get used to it, though. Once, in Hawaii, some fifteen years ago, he was a scrawny kid alongside four other scrawny kids without any idea of what’s in store for them. Fifteen years later, he’s still alongside the same four he once boarded a yacht with, but they’re men now and they’ve come a long way from the 1999 debut, from that declaration of, “We’ll create a storm throughout the world!”, and from their home.

But Sho looks at the four people he’s sharing drinks with and thinks, maybe not so far from home.

\--

After enduring Aiba’s drunken karaoke and laughing at Ohno’s impressions of whoever he deemed fit to be impersonated and whoever Nino goaded him into doing, he wants nothing but to crash.

He remembers nothing of his interactions with Jun, aside from the casual cheers and clinking of glasses. Sometime during the night, he and Jun may have taken it upon themselves to bring their fellow bandmates to bed, because Sho remembers, distantly, that he went up the elevator far later than the time he ought to have taken to reach it had he been alone.

Before he has successfully closed the door to his room, however, he sees Jun outside with a bottle of wine in his hand. “Wouldn’t want it to go to waste,” is all he says to Sho, and Sho lets him in. Maybe it’s the alcohol already swimming in his veins, maybe it’s the successful Hawaii concert, or maybe, just maybe, it’s because it’s Jun outside his door and God knows how many times he shut the door in Jun’s face in the past to the point that he feels the need to make up for it alongside his guilt.

Maybe it’s all of those happening at the same time and Sho, sometime in the past, lost his control over them and over himself to even refuse anymore.

“I’m a little drunk myself, Matsujun,” he prides himself on saying without slurring, and hears Jun’s familiar shrug. “It’s just wine. It won’t get to you that fast.”

He decides to trust Jun this time and grabs the glass Jun poured out for him. He doesn’t drink it, not yet at least, and just lets the wine swirl in the glass. He watches as Jun makes himself comfortable in the nearest surface available, his dresser. Sho’s not surprised, he didn’t really expect Jun to sit in the chair across the room. Macchan would do that. In fact, Macchan would ask permission if he can come in. And J, well, J would probably just sit there without asking, but this is Jun. Jun, who successfully managed to enter Sho’s room in the middle of the night leaving Sho wondering why.

Had this been Macchan, he would have known. He used to talk to him in the same time during the night and used to tell him to, “Go to sleep, you’ve got a long day tomorrow,” and Macchan would either listen to him or stubbornly refuse to end the line. Usually, it’s the latter. Sometimes, Macchan would call him and Sho would grudgingly answer only to tell him he was listening to a CD, before hanging up.

Had this been J, they would have started talking how grateful they are for the success, the fans, the opportunities. This is Hawaii, this is where everything began, and nostalgia ought to hit sooner or later. Had this been J, they would have discussed future plans and subsequent concerts to be held overseas, if given the chance and if the opportunity presents itself. Had this been J, he would have been out of Sho’s room in an hour and Sho would get to rest his alcohol-swaddled head sooner than he planned.

But this is Jun, and Jun is just staring at him from his position at the dresser with his own wine in hand and Sho feels far more light-headed than he originally thought possible.

\--

“Why did you let me in,” is what Jun says when he finally chooses to break the silence and Sho lets the words run around his head for a moment. It takes a beat for it to sink in, that Jun isn’t asking a question, but what he means by it escapes Sho entirely.

Across the room, he thinks that as Jun sits on his dresser, while he looks out of place in Sho’s surroundings, he is still distinctively making an impression of his own. From his sitting position on his bed, Sho wonders, briefly, how Jun does it. Does it come naturally? Does Matsumoto Jun seem to seamlessly fit over the edges of Sho’s alcohol-fueled brain while at the same time, looking too jagged to fit perfectly? Does it have anything to do with Jun, or is it just Sho?

He chooses to look at Jun, and finds that for the first time since the celebratory drinking with Ohno, Nino, and Aiba, he’s meeting Jun’s eyes. He remembers the last time he had the chance to look at those eyes without cameras and lights around. He remembers it vaguely, but it’s more than enough: last time they held nothing but disappointment for him. As if Sho did something he shouldn’t have, but perhaps, that really was the case. Like many things, Sho was probably just unaware of it, whatever it was.

This time is different, though. He knows it and knows that Jun does, too. From his position on the edge of the bed, Sho understands that he and Jun have reached something, something they never dared to cross before and Sho knows if he makes a misstep, he'll hear something shatter and he hasn’t heard that a long time ago but it’s something far too familiar in his ears.

Sho takes a sip. It’s a good wine and the taste lingers long enough. He has never doubted Jun’s preference over the damn things, but it’s not every day he gets to indulge in Matsumoto’s choices for beverages. Sho licks his lips, letting the taste of fermentation linger further, before setting the glass down on the floor. He catches Jun’s eye and knows Jun watched the whole thing.

Feeling far braver than he actually is, he says, in reply, “Why are you here, then?”

He sees Jun’s nostrils flaring and knows he’s done it. Struck a nerve, probably shouldn’t have opened his mouth, but then again, here they are in a scenario Sho can solely blame on the wine. He won’t take it back; he’ll let Jun get angry over it. He had his fair share of frustrations, when Jun cornered him and told him game’s over but didn’t let him talk, when Jun ascertained that the barrier between them is carefully in place before shedding some skin and showing a piece of someone Sho used to know really well, someone Sho used to have around all the time.

He had his fair share of sleepless nights and workaholic days and countless drinks just to forget, and he’s too drunk to take back anything. Let Jun feel it, he thinks bitterly. Let him feel the frustration of having someone continuously dodge you, even when you finally think you’re alone.

“I asked you first,” Jun counters, and Sho wants to laugh, so he does. He laughs and it’s something akin to what Yoshimoto-sensei does when something particularly delightful for his own brand of weird and twisted sense of humor happens. He hasn’t laughed like that in front of Jun before, and the change is evident. Jun schools his features and Sho can see him mentally preparing for whatever Sho’s got to say.

Perhaps Jun isn’t as drunk as he is, but Sho’s too far gone to care about that now. He fakes a cough, stands in one fluid motion, and says, “You didn’t ask a question, Matsumoto-san, how am I supposed to answer something that isn’t directed at me?” Jun stares at him with an expression he can’t name. It’s the alcohol, and only now is Sho certain of it. If he wasn’t this far gone, he might have known how Jun looks at him, right now. He might have a name for it. Isn’t that what he likes doing, anyway? Trying his damn hardest to put a name to something he doesn’t know?

Jun leaves his spot from the dresser, wine glass still in hand, and takes careful, measured steps towards him. Sho doesn’t allow himself to take a step back, it’s just Jun and they’re finally picking up where they left off. He thinks if he listens closely enough, he will hear a familiar crunch along with Jun’s feet moving across the carpeted floor.

Once again, they’re both treading on broken glass and Sho thinks, finally, we meet halfway. He remembers Pikanchi 2.5 and notes that this is it, this is theirs. This is him and Jun standing between something they both never chose to name, and it took a while to meet halfway, but they’re here.

“You’re right, Sakurai-san,” Jun tells him as they stand face to face. “It wasn’t directed at you.”

He feels the tug of eighteen year old Sho and his desire for this thirty-two year old self to say, “No shit,” on his behalf, but he controls himself. Not yet. For some reason, he knows that Jun still has something else to say and knows that he, along with eighteen year old Sho, are both dying to hear it. He waits. They both do. It may be all he can do right now.

Jun tilts his head to the side and drinks from his glass, finishing the whole thing. Sho glances to the glass at his feet. At their feet, apparently, because when he looks up again, Jun’s come far closer than he was originally. A part of Sho wants to back down, to assert his rights to personal space and to recheck his defenses, but as he thought earlier, if he makes a misstep, he might hear something.

The fear of cutting himself for Matsumoto Jun to see makes him stand his ground.

He just meets Jun’s eyes for probably the longest time and watches as Jun licks his own lips, as he waits, in the most patient way he can manage, for whatever Jun has to say. The wine’s gone now, and Sho takes that as an indication that it’s coming sooner or later.

“I was hoping you wouldn’t hold that door open long enough for me to come in because I honestly have no idea what I’m doing here,” Jun says, and Sho finds himself not even the slightest bit surprised. He doesn’t know what Jun is doing here either. They finally come to something like an understanding for the first time in a long time, but he won’t let Jun blame him for being here in the first place.

“But, I think, after all, it’s all about whether you’d actually let me in or not,” Jun continues. “We both know how many times you didn’t, anyway.”

“I’m sorry,” Sho begins before he knows it, before he knows what he’s actually apologizing for, but Jun shakes his head and tells him that, no, “You don’t get to say that. Not after so many years. Not to me.”

Is it this again? Is Jun not going to let him speak for the second time around? There’s no hand to stop him from doing so, not this time. In fact, there’s nothing between them but Jun meeting him halfway and an unfinished wine glass at their feet. There’s no barrier, not anymore, and this is probably the longest time in a long time there hasn’t been.

So instead Sho says the first honest thing he’s always wanted Jun to know. “I didn’t know I was losing you, back then.” He sighs. Jun’s face doesn’t betray anything; he still looks out of place in Sho’s room with red in his cheeks and a bit of anger in his eyes.

“I told you, back then, the last time we actually talked to each other, that I was tired,” Jun says, and Sho takes it far better than he imagined he would be able to. Perhaps running the conversation over his head whenever sleep won’t take him helped numb whatever sting he was supposed to be feeling. Or perhaps Sho just got used to it. You can only ponder over something for so long and sooner or later, you’ll probably get used to how it makes you feel. Maybe that’s what he’s feeling now. He isn’t sure, and Jun is saying, “Do you know why I got tired, Sakurai-san?”

Sho pauses. This is Jun’s first question in the night, one actually directed at him. And like so many things about Jun, he doesn’t know. He finds himself admitting it and doing so being far easier than what he originally perceived.

Jun laughs, actually laughs, for the first time since he entered Sho’s room, wine glass still in hand. It’s nothing like Yoshimoto-sensei’s, but it has the distinct feel of similar mockery over it that Sho actually feels it directed at him. He sees Jun look at his lips, his nose, his cheeks, at every part of his face before finally, finally meeting his eyes.

He sees no disappointment or resignation. It’s just him and Jun, and whatever honest thing Jun can find himself to say now. There’s nothing between them but an empty glass of wine in Jun’s hand and a half-full one at their feet.

“You never looked back, Sho-kun. That’s why.”

And then Jun moves away from him, setting his used wine glass on Sho’s dresser, and leaves the room.

\--

It’s only when Jun has finally left and Sho is sitting on the floor while cradling a half-full glass of wine that he realizes they’re playing something else now.

But like everything else concerning Jun, he doesn’t know what to call it, or how it’s played. He doesn’t think Jun will take the time to tell him either.

\--

He wakes up with a headache he deems to be slightly larger than Fukuoka Dome in estimation with his face down on the mattress, and rummages through his bag for a container of pills. He should have drunk some water before going to bed, but then again, he doesn’t even remember how he reached the bed. He opens one eye and sees a wine glass on his bedside table. He knows if he moves, he’ll find a bottle perched somewhere near or on top of his dresser, and much as he doesn’t want to see that form of mockery so early in a Hawaiian morning, he has some painkillers to take.

As he waits for the medication to work, he finds himself sitting on the edge of his bed with his phone in hand. He takes a moment to look at it to remember that it doesn’t work like it normally would, that he’s in not in Japan and had he been in Japan, had they been in Japan this probably wouldn’t have happened.

But this is Hawaii and Sakurai Sho has come a long way from the scrawny kid and a long way from home. This Sakurai Sho is someone who spends a bit of time thinking, if that same kid from fifteen years ago can see him now, what would he say?

\--

Going back to Japan has never been so difficult. Sho is glad for the Hawaii experience; he is grateful for the overseas support and actually agreed when Aiba said, as part of his message for the concert, that this is just the beginning for Arashi. He has been part of so many beginnings involving Arashi and each new beginning never fails to take him by surprise.

But something else also began in Hawaii and he doesn’t know how to react to it once it hits. He remembers how Nino told him that he and Jun danced around each other for a while. Sho just didn’t think that a while would turn into something far longer than he can prepare himself for.

But then again, they’ve got work piling up and before anything else, he is Sakurai Sho from Arashi. He can be whoever Matsumoto Jun wants him to be when he has settled himself and planted his foot on the ground.

Until then, he will do what everyone expects him to, because he’s someone else now. They both are. Whatever it is they’re playing now, whatever this is he can’t name and Jun left hanging in the air along with the scent of fermented grapes somewhere across the Pacific, it would have to wait.

\--

Twenty-two year old Sakurai Sho knows nothing about patience, but he’s come a long way from that Sho. He’s thirty-two now, doing things he didn’t think he’s capable of if someone asked him ten years ago. He has changed, they all have. Ohno took his time, Nino had his done seemingly without effort, Aiba let his happen without considering most of the consequences, and Jun had his far later than he should have.

Sho doesn’t know how much he changed or how he got to it, but he thinks it’s not too late.

Twenty-two year old Sakurai Sho would let his temper and his frustrations get the best of him. He would probably not compromise either.

Sho thinks that he still carries some of those frustrations, but he knows better by now.

\--

He gives it time. He and Jun still dance around each other, but he thinks that night in Hawaii cleared something up for the both of them. There’s still misunderstanding hanging in the air, the tension is still present, for it’s not something that will go away overnight, but he thinks it might have abated. A little, perhaps.

It’s only when they are filming their first Shiyagare SP episode since their return and Aiba puts his arm around Jun’s shoulders and says, “Hawaii was really something, ne?” that he confirms it. He meets Jun’s eyes and they both say, “It was,” at the same time. There’s a murmur from the audience and Nino looks three seconds away from snickering, but Sho doesn’t drop the gaze.

Sho still has no idea where he stands when Jun is involved, and there might be a barrier still standing between them, but this time, Jun’s not reminding him of it. He thinks of changes, of progress, of exerting a modicum of effort, and of everything else that will come.

He looks at Ohno and sees the older man smiling. He can give it more time.

\--

“You’re both stubborn people,” one of their guests in VS Arashi once told the both of them.

Sho thinks that, yes, that might be true, because when he said to himself he’s tired of running, it still took him quite a while to stop. Perhaps it’s the same for Jun too, who once said he’s tired of chasing after Sho because Sho never looked back, not even once. Jun might have stopped chasing him, but that doesn’t mean he also stopped going after him.

If he’s walking now, he thinks it’s only a matter of time before Jun catches up to him.

\--

Jun is sitting on a couch across the room and Sho thinks, maybe it’s now or never.

He chooses now. Two years ago, Sakurai Sho would most likely choose never and opt to wait, and it would have been the right thing to do. But he isn’t that Sakurai Sho coming down from post-Hawaii haze anymore. He has given it the time it needs, whatever it is he has with Jun. Over the course of two years, he and Jun has reached some form of silent agreement that they will focus on Arashi and put it first before anything else.

If they had to lie in front of a camera, fake a smile for an interview, stage an interaction for national television, they would do it. Not that it happened often, but they do what they had to do when the situation calls for it. Jun calls it professionalism. Sho thinks it’s simply doing what they do best.

But not anymore. He’s thirty-four, Jun is thirty-three, and so far, no one has shown them the DVD of Jun staking his claim over him, but it’s bound to come sooner or later, he believes. Their anniversary is approaching and someone will think of doing it eventually. Sho thinks he better brace himself for that moment when it comes.

So Sho decides to go for a head start. If someone intends to remind him and Jun of the innocent and heartfelt declaration of, “I won’t give Sho-kun to anyone,” Sho will beat them to it. He’s run for so long, maybe it’s time to walk.

He clears his throat to get Jun’s attention and when he finally does, he thinks thirty-two year old Sakurai Sho would have been proud.

\--

The next day, when Sho gets to the greenroom far later than normal, he sees that he and Jun are wearing the same shirt. The same shirt he once invited Jun to wear with him.

He finds himself greeted by a too energetic and uncharacteristic, "Good morning, Sho-chan," from Nino, and Sho wants to roll his eyes, but he's too busy smiling.

\--

They end up addressing Sho’s unsaid truths that accumulated over the years in Jun’s car, when Jun’s driving him home after a rehearsal for AraFes. He and Jun meticulously went over the setlist and checked the technical stuff that was most definitely somebody else’s job, but Jun wants everything to be perfect, and Sho’s always been under Jun’s whims despite Jun not knowing just how much.

“You’re wrong,” is what Sho opts to say in the end, because he honestly doesn’t think Jun will understand what he wants him to understand for so many years without making it difficult. He and Jun almost always avoided the most direct of approaches and maybe it’s time to change tactics. They clashed heads more often enough and there’s so much misunderstanding floating around despite the both of them ignoring their existence, and Sho thinks it’s time to lessen them out.

Jun doesn’t say anything, but there’s no hand between them and no wine this time, so Sho takes it as his cue to proceed.

“It’s not that I didn’t look back,” he continues, and he sees Jun’s eyes narrow in understanding. They take a right and Sho sees that Jun is going around the area he lives in. He’s not being dropped off and cut off from whatever he wants Jun to know. It is progress and something Jun from two years ago never allowed him to have. He takes it as a blessing and thinks that giving it time certainly paid off.

“I was so hung up with the idea of having you around that I thought you would be there no matter what,” Sho finishes.

“You told me to fuck off,” Jun reminds him, but there’s no bitterness there, no anger. No, it’s simply Jun stating what eighteen year old Sho once told the seventeen year old Jun. Two years ago, Jun would have probably lashed out on his face and Sho would probably have something like an apology singing in his veins. Then again, if this was two years ago, they wouldn’t be here.

“I had a lot of issues,” Sho says, and Jun snaps, almost immediately, “That’s not an excuse.”

Ah, so he’s still got it, Sho observes. Somewhere under this glasses-wearing Matsumoto Jun driving around Sho’s compound for probably the third time is the thirty-one year old Matsumoto Jun with a wine glass in his hand and suppressed anger in his features. It showed a bit of itself to Sho just now, two years later, but Sho will never forget how it looks like.

“And I’m not making it to turn out like one, I’m really not. It was a shitty time and I had a lot going on, and my mistake was taking it out on you,” Sho admits. It feels liberating, that he can finally say these things without anything stopping him. He wonders how the barrier he and Jun stubbornly erected between them started to disappear.

Gradually, he once told Aiba. He finds himself believing it.

“And I wanted to say sorry for that,” he tells Jun. “I still am sorry for it.”

For a while, it’s just the sound of Jun’s car tires scraping across the pavement coupled with the air conditioning and Sho fears, for the first time in that night, that Jun will finally drop him off with nothing but a polite, “Thanks for your hard work.”

But then Jun says something else, and it’s something Sho’s been wanting to hear to come from him all along, for Sho to finally believe it.

“I had to grow up sooner or later, anyway.”

Sho remembers his conversation with Ninomiya when they had a greenroom to themselves and he had a paper in his face. “Yes, in one way or another,” he agrees, and thinks, ah, fuck it. He’s tired of unspoken truths and unfinished sentences. He’s tired of hiding from Jun, tired from all the running.

“But you didn’t have to get over me.”

Jun finally stops the car and they’re here, they’re right in front Sho’s apartment after circling the area for Jun knows how many times. Jun is still silent, but Sho knows Jun won’t misinterpret what he just said. Sho’s been perfectly clear to him for the first time since a drunken night in Hawaii.

He waits for Jun to unlock the doors and when he doesn’t, Sho looks at him expectantly.

He catches Jun smiling at him. “No, I didn’t,” Jun says, and Sho finally hears the doors unlocking.

“Good night, Sho-kun,” is the last thing he hears before seeing Matsumoto Jun drive off into the cold Tokyo night. Not Macchan, not J, not Matsumoto Jun from Arashi.

It’s just Jun, and Sho thinks it’s a start.

\--

At one point in their AraFes concert, while he’s singing Still, Jun suddenly sings it with him. It wasn’t planned; they went over the plan multiple times in every night of that week, so he knows it is genuine surprise fifty thousand people can see right now on his face. In another moving stage, the other three might be laughing or smiling at it, but Sho doesn’t notice, not really.

He’s only looking at Jun, and feels that he can finally understand what Jun’s been trying to tell him all these years: what Macchan, J, and Matsumoto Jun worked themselves up altogether for him to know. Maybe that’s what Sho has always been wrong about all these years.

He knows Ninomiya probably pulled some strings to get him and Jun alone in the greenroom, to have them bask together in post-concert afterglow. When Jun smiles at him, Sho crosses the room and does something none of his younger selves would have, or could have.

Jun meets him halfway, and that’s all it takes. Sho lets go.

He still doesn’t know what to call it, but he can finally say that there’s nothing, nothing between them. Not anymore.

\--

Sho remembers, that four-something years ago, he and Jun met halfway already, albeit prematurely. He thinks it's odd that it’s still considered premature even if they were both in their early thirties and in their way, they both have come so far.

“Not far enough,” Jun says, and Sho agrees. Maybe that’s the flaw he and Jun both share. They can only go so far, can only take so much before they both realize that they can’t really stray too far from one another, not for long and never, never far enough.

He looks at Jun and knows he’s finally done with assumptions. This time, he knows that whatever he knows, whatever reality he has come to terms with, Jun knows it as well.

They have finally worked out their differences and arrived at the same point at the same time.

It is enough.

\--

Someone once told him, some years ago, that, “it’ll take a while, but you’ll get there in the end.”

Sho thinks he now knows whoever the ‘you’ meant, and that it is worth it, after all.

\--

When all the hype has settled down and Sho finally got the chance to tell Jun that he missed him, missed having his Macchan around, missed Arashi’s J by his side, and missed Matsumoto Jun altogether, they find themselves lying side by side on two mattresses and in a cottage they'd once been in, some seven or eight years ago.

It’s dark and again there’s a camera filming, but Sho knows it won’t catch whatever he wants to tell Jun, whatever’s left for him to say. Nino and the others probably would, but that’s okay. They’ve come a long way, after all. They understand, and will continue to understand.

Wasn’t it Nino who once said that they won’t mind it if he and Jun had something they can solely call their own?

So Sho settles for their now eighteen year old question, the one that had been a long time coming and a long time waiting. “Is it love? Or like?” he whispers in the darkness, and lets it hang in the air.

Once, his thirty-two year old self would have wasted his time thinking about the three different answers for three different versions of Jun and what they could have given him, but they would all turn out to be the same thing: that Sho already knew it for himself. He waits for a moment, and in the darkness surrounding them, he thinks Jun’s probably asleep already. He settles for asking it in another time. They have all the time now, anyway, and no one’s rushing things.

But Sho feels a shift to his right and when he turns, he sees Jun facing him. It’s a little dark to see, but he thinks Jun is smiling.

“Find out with me,” Jun whispers back, and Sho thinks, yes, he can do that.


End file.
